In 1976, I went there myself to find out what was behind this phenomenon.
This story starts in Baguio City, a mountain retreat for the well-to-do and where several hotels were known to facilitate psychic surgery and where the high profile Tony Agpaoa operated.
I could not afford to see Agpaoa as he catered only to desperate tourists with lots of money and who had been carefully screened. People who saw him came on tours especially designed for the sick and dying and organized in Europe and North America. I did not fit the criteria. But besides that, I wanted to see what was behind the phenomenon and as luck would have it, I found the man who started the whole thing.
His name was Eleuterio Terte and I went to where he was supposed to be ministering to local people in a residential area. Instead of Mr. Terte, I found an Australian woman who said she was learning magnetic healing from him. She stated to me that he was resting and that if I wanted to see him I would have to travel to Pangasinan, his home province, the next day.
It was clear from the beginning that this man was not getting rich from his endeavours. All that his followers could afford to give him were a few pesos and all he charged was a voluntary donation.
I went the following day to the home of Mr. Terte in Pangasinan, the province to the south of the Baguio City, out of the cool mountains and onto the hot lowlands.
Mr. Terte was the leader of the Union Espiritista Christiana de Filipinas. It was a church but it also traded on the stock market. On one had it was the local religion of poor villagers and on the other hand there was a lot of money at stake.
When I arrived Mr. Terte was expecting me.
What appeared to be an entire village turned out to a religious ceremony in a church next to his residence. They were dressed in their finest and sang hymns and Mr. Terte performed operations and gave sermons
I think Mr. Terte was expecting the usual tourist with a compact camera and ten minutes of film. I had four hours of film. I set my camera up on a tipod and ignored him. Every ten minutes I would change film and batteries. Eventually he stopped paying any attention to me and started dealing with the local people as he normally did.
-Psychic Surgery must be understood within the context of its culture
